Kendall’s “Hood Feminism” (2020): Asking the Readers to Rethink about Mainstream Feminism
Inequality has a very close relation to race and class. Many people believe that feminism is highly encouraged the equality of women in society. However, the principle of feminism that is echoed, especially in the European and the USA’s society is heavily centered on white women who have more wealth, power, and privilege than any other women from other races such as Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians. This is the main problem of feminism value that should be realized by society worldwide and we must start to give away the spot and chances for all women’s rights to be respected.
Kendall herself is a Black woman who has the real-life experience of living in the USA society. Throughout her life, she encountered a lot of inequality as a black woman in terms of safety, education, health care, poverty, housing, politics, as well as reproductive justice. This is in contrast with England et al., (2020) who argue, “The percentage of women (age 25 to 54) who are employed rose continuously from 1970 until 2000”. They also add that women have surpassed men in gaining baccalaureate and doctoral degrees. Then the question emerges, what kind of women have gained equality? Whereas in fact women from the third-world and marginalized groups were continuously living in pathetic situations such as poverty, hunger, and poor health care.
Mainstream feminism’s mistake came from women themselves. During the early protest of political movements in the 1960s, radical white women were disappointed with the patriarchal values applied in society. Thus, they created an ideology of female liberation by gathering their common interests as members of a powerless group than men (Lewis, 1977). Nevertheless, the definition of women that they define was “connected to white or mainstream or hegemonic forms of feminist discourse. This relationship is both political and moral” (Lepinard, 2020).
In addition, mainstream feminism “failed to recognize was that their notion of womanhood was modeled on the experiences and problems of a small percentage of females who were white, middle-class, and relatively well-educated” (Lepinard, 2020). The definition of womanhood that the first feminism wave proposed has failed to represent the issues of women in the bigger picture. White women were trying to ignore the rights of other women who were not only suffering due to sexism but also race and class. As Kendall says, “the history of the women’s suffrage movement includes a clear goal of maintaining white supremacy by giving white women equal power with white men” (p. 133).
That is why the homework for all women in the 20th century and so on are proposing many ideas of what it means to be a woman and what are the social issues that they encountered in the society that they lived in. Since it is extremely hard to generalize the definition of “women” itself, we have to be able to refer and address the real problem then together seek a way to find the solution for the problems, thus equity for all women will be possible to be achieved.
The problems and struggles that are faced by women from different races, classes, and marginalized groups are different from each other. For instance, black women do not have the access to the easiness of getting health care treatment rather than white women do, or hundreds of companies are rejecting Muslim women to get a job just because of the belief that they hold, or Asian American women were likely to be assaulted than white women do in a workplace.
Despite the problem of too generalized women’s problems proposed by white women in mainstream feminism, Miki Kendall is very brave to point out the mistakes explicitly and offer alternative solutions to third-world women and women from marginalized groups.
Kendall’s critics of mainstream feminism may hopefully be useful for society worldwide in pointing out the error within the movement that they have proposed all this time. This is now the time for society around the world in defining women and their problems in the bigger picture without abolishing the rights of women from any race or class. We need to be able to point out the issue, seek the solution, and realize the solution in the public institutions as well as officially create the laws and policies to protect women’s rights.
I think the only flaw that this book possessed is the limit of cases and examples that are presented. Kendall only focuses on the problems encountered by black women, although she says she wanted to illuminate the struggle of women that is forgotten by mainstream feminism. Maybe Kendall should ask other women from different races and social backgrounds to collaborate in writing this kind of book. As a result, more women’s issues are represented and more solutions are offered.
Conclusively, as Kendall says that freedom has a price that we all must pay together (p. 55); therefore, this is the time for all women regardless of what races or classes that they belong to, they have to gather and support each other. Thus, the real goal of feminism will be successfully achieved.
References:
England et, al. (2020). Progress toward gender equality in the United States has slowed or stalled. New York University Press.
Kendall, Miki. (2020). Hood Feminism. New York: Viking
Lewis, Diane K. (1977). A Response to Inequality: Black Women, Racism, and Sexism. Chicago Journals, Vol. 3, №2 (Winter, 1977), pp. 339–36. The University of Chicago Press.
Lepinard, Eleonore. (2020). Feminist Trouble: Intersectional Politics in Post-Secular Times. Oxford Scholarship Online.
